Love after Death (S1) [Completed]

Chapter 45: The Architecture of Ashes

Liam's POV

The visiting room smelled faintly of disinfectant and stale coffee, the kind of smell that clung to prison walls and to memory. I sat across from him-Robin DeGuzman-and felt the years between us collapse in an instant. Eight years. Eight years of quiet conversation, careful trust, and camaraderie forged behind steel bars and cold cement. Back then, we were just two men surviving the system, tethered by tragedy, by loss, by secrets we hadn't dared to speak.

And now, the ground beneath me was shifting, threatening to swallow everything. I clenched my fists on the table, nails biting into my palms. My chest felt heavy, like the air itself had thickened with unspoken truths.

"Robin... I need to tell you something. Something I just realized." I said, looking directly at him. "It's really you."

He looked up from the folder of legal documents in front of him. The familiarity of the gesture-the furrow of his brow, the slight twitch in his jaw-made my stomach twist.

"Liam... what is it? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"It's about Monique."

His posture stiffened. The careful calm of the past eight years evaporated like mist.

"Monique? What about her? You... you knew her, didn't you?"

I froze. How could I even begin to explain that I had loved her, that her absence had left a permanent scar? The truth felt like lead in my chest.

"I... I knew her. I... I loved her." My voice caught.

Robin's hand tightened on the papers before him, knuckles white. His eyes softened-but not fully, a glint of sharpness lurking behind the grief.

"You loved her?" he asked finally, voice low but edged with disbelief. "And you never told me?"

"I didn't know how or if I even should. I only realized now that you were part of her story too. That you cared in your own way."

Robin's jaw tightened. He studied me like he was reading my soul, weighing the truth in silence. Then he let out a fragile breath.

"You really knew her?" he whispered. "All these years and you carried her in your heart?"

"I did," I said quietly. "And I never forgot her. I never stopped remembering. I just didn't know you were out there, fighting your own battles."

His hand hovered above the table, unsure whether to reach out or pull back.

"All these years, I thought I had lost her forever," he said, voice trembling. "And now someone else cared for her too?"

"I did," I said softly. "My family... we were the ones who found Monique at the park when Maze abandoned her. She lived with us for ten years after that. And I never stopped caring. I just didn't know how much we had in common, until now."

"She died." Robin said, voice breaking.

I nodded, my eyes stinging. "She died from a brain tumor. She left this world not knowing who her mother was, why she had been left at the park."